What are you playing?...

I love games. That’s why I get so much joy out of making them. I’ll play anything from solitaire (perhaps the most successful casual game ever) to the latest shooter. Lately, I’ve been playing Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3, Civilization IV, Borderlands, the Halo: Reach beta,...

Design Principle #5 –...

Will you suspend your disbelief for us?  It is critically important that you, the player, feel immersed in the world that Marjorie has created and we’ve put into game form.  The choices made by the art team and guided by the art director are clearly some of the highest impact ways to...

Where could Emma Ward b...

It seems that we have some people on Emma Ward’s heels.  Maybe you can help her twin sister, Ainsley, find her! Go here to start the adventure: ...

Unfounded Vilification ...

It’s interesting to me that while the gaming and romance book fandoms aren’t typically considered overlapping interests, they do face similar stereotyping from the general public. I guess I can be considered both a gamer and a romance reader – although, I don’t have the honor of...

Game developers are rom...

The game industry is sometimes vilified as catering only to some mythical, insanely violent male audience. If this is the case why would we go so against the grain to make romantic games for women? For one thing Casual Games are geared towards non-hardcore players who also happen to be...

Price of Digital Books...

I’m sure you’ve seen the stories about the Amazon and Macmilian e-book price wars from a few weeks back. DRM and some other issues have also come up in relation to...

Design Principle #4 –...

A wise, sometimes controversial, and well-known game designer once told me (over an impromptu breakfast at GDC), “One of the most important lessons I ever learned was that you don’t have to be an expert in everything.”  The designer creates and guides the overall vision of how the...

Design Principle #3 –...

Today is the third of the guiding design principles.  And it is (drumroll please) useful stuff. I have a lot of hopes and dreams and goals for this game (as I do for every game I work on).  For this series, I want to make it so that everything the player does and encounters furthers the...

Romance novels...

So, I’ve read Dirk and Steele.  I’ve read some Harlequin stuff.  I’ve read the first in the Mercy Thompson series (thanks to a local paranormal romance reading group.)  And, of course, I’ve read the entire Twilight series (and saw the movies at the midnight release… yeah…...

Design Principle #2 –...

Guiding design principle number 2 is incorporating story into all aspects of the game. It’s important that the player feels like they have a purpose in every part of the game. So, every level should tell a small story. This directly affects the logic and sequential steps that I...